Jindal swings the ax

About six months after Hurricane Katrina made mincemeat of former Gov. Kathleen Blanco's first and only term, I predicted that Blanco might be able to recover politically because her administration would soon be swimming in recovery-related dollars, and "there aren't too many politicians who can manage to look bad in those shoes."

What I didn't anticipate back in 2006 was that Blanco would be the rare elected official to pull that off.

Now, Blanco is retired from government, and her successor, Gov. Bobby Jindal, is wearing a very different pair of shoes. The national economic meltdown, tax cuts and spending that increased during flusher times, and the drop in oil and gas prices have combined to create a huge shortfall. Jindal's budget, which will dominate the upcoming legislative session, proposes nearly $3 billion in spending cuts, or 9.8 percent. Without the federal stimulus package and lingering post-hurricane activity, the picture would be even worse.

There aren't too many politicians who can manage to look good in that position.

Jindal, obviously, is determined to be the exception to that particular rule.

His spin is that government is bloated. The crisis presents an opportunity to take a fresh look at duplicative programs and outdated civil service rules, he argues.

So far so good.

But if Jindal thinks he can dismiss all the programs he wants to cut as pure waste, he's fooling himself.

Everybody likes small government when the reductions hit someone else. But given the size of the shortfall, proposed cuts will hit close to a lot of people's homes.

In objecting to Jindal's proposal to lop off a good chunk of his culture, recreation and tourism budget -- 17 percent or 30, depending on who's counting -- Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu is obviously guarding his turf. But Landrieu is also correct that tourism is an economic boon to Louisiana, and marketing the state pays dividends.

Same with arts funding, which Jindal proposes cutting by more than half.

The people who are likely to grouse aren't just Democrats like Landrieu.

Plenty of Republicans send their kids to LSU, which faces a possible $49 million reduction in funding.

The Uptown nursing home that Jindal proposes selling, John J. Hainkel Jr. Home & Rehabilitation Center, was the pet project of the late state Sen. John Hainkel, a GOP stalwart.

Then there's the nearby New Orleans Adolescent Hospital, which Jindal wants to fold into a facility all the way up in Mandeville.

When it comes to NOAH, supporters of the hospital and the administration don't even seem to be speaking the same language. Jindal's health and hospitals director Alan Levine talks of inefficiencies and focuses on the financial costs of running two hospitals. Hospital partisans speak of the desperate need for mental health services in New Orleans, accessible to a vulnerable population and close enough so that patients' families can provide support. They don't hear anyone talking about the human element.

None of this is to argue that painful cuts can be avoided.

The point is that Jindal could do a much better job of showing his constituents that he feels their looming pain.

This is nothing new. In 2003, when Blanco beat Jindal for governor, her most successful line of attack was that as state health secretary, Jindal focused more on numbers than patients.

Blanco attributed Jindal's supposed callousness to his youth, but six years later, he still hasn't developed much of an instinct for identifying what other people consider wasteful, and what they don't. Just ask the folks who live in the Northwest what they thought of Jindal's slap at "something called volcano monitoring, " in his big nationally televised speech in February.

If Jindal hopes to join Blanco in defying the odds, a little more sensitivity would definitely help.

He doesn't just need to nurse the state to fiscal health. He needs to put a little work into his bedside manner.

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Stephanie Grace is a staff writer. She may be reached at 504.826.3383.